Question Sixteen of Chapter Nine of the Third Decade
Why sortileges, divinations, and incantations abound more among women than among men
It is asked why the three sins—namely, sortileges, divinations, incantations, and things of this kind—abound more among women than among men.
It is answered that the case was one way with the teaching of God and another with the teaching of the devil, because the teaching of God descended from God into Christ, from Christ into man, and from man into woman.
The Apostle touches upon this order in 1 Corinthians 11, saying: “The head of every man is Christ, the head of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God.”
In contrast, it was so in the teaching of the devil, because the devil himself first poured it into the woman, who possessed less sense and discretion of spirit, and through the woman into the man. Therefore the aforementioned sins are found more readily and frequently in the female sex than in the male.
These things are from Alexander, Second Part of the Summa, question 53, On Sortilege, article 6.
Addition
These things have place in women rather than in men because unbelief, ambition, and lust appear chiefly to reign in them, as the author of the Hammer of Witches proves in Part I, question 6, and because they burn more fiercely to fulfill their depraved desires.